ALLIANCE
Marxist-Leninist (North America) Number 35: August 2000With corrections to prior errata: Version of August 28th;
2000 - with apologies to Comrade Altinoglu

NOTES ON THE HISTORY OF MLKP
AND THE REVOLUTIONARY MOVEMENT IN TURKEYBy Garbis Altinoglu

A
Brief Foreword by Alliance Those who have followed either
the pages of Alliance, or those of International Struggle Marxist-Leninist
(ISML) - will know that work of the Marxist Leninist Communist Party of
Turkey (MLCP) has been of fraternal interest to us. The MLCP was a founding
member of ISML; and we in Alliance have published their programme and publicly
acknowledged their programme and other contributions. It is therefore necessary
that we are frank about the current events within the MLCP. It has become
clear to us that an intense inner-debate has publicly erupted.It is acknowledged within the Turkish
movement that the author of this essay is a respected Marxist-Leninist
commentator. He won a right to speak in Marxist-Leninist forums on
Turkey, from his struggles for the movement leading to incarceration in
the prisons of the Turkish fascists.We believe Comrade Altinoglu's
analysis carries resonance for the international Marxist-Leninist movement
and have decided to publish this in our pages. We believe that in having
previously printed and praised the Programme of the MLCP, this is our duty.
Moreover, there is intense interest in the Turkish movement and its dedicated
fighters - this essay gives the outsider a sense of organisational
realities inside the Turkish Marxist-Leninist movement. The general problems
described of forging a real unity are not unique to the Turkish movement. Finally we recognise
that our status is 'outside' of the debate, so we stress that we do also
offer our pages to any contrary views from those of Comrade Altinoglu.
It is our current understanding that none of the participants in the debate
have withdrawn from the ISML. We will freely acknowledge comments made
by any of the participants in the inner-party debate.Alliance; August 2000.

Table of Contents- A glossary of Parties and
Fronts referred to in text- Essay- End Notes

The MLKP was
founded at a Unity Congress held in September 1994, through the fusion
of theTKP/M-L Hareketi and the TKIH.
At the time it had chosen to call itself MLKP-K.
This essay shall attempt to summarize the history of the MLKP and its constituents
and evaluate the present position of this organization.

Although it
was the product of the fusion of two main groups, it was the TKP/M-L Hareketi,
which formed the ideological backbone of the MLKP.One should get to know the TKP/M-L
Hareketi more closely to be able to understand the present plight of the
MLKP. That's the reason why, among the two main constituents of the MLKP,
priority has been assigned to the treatment of the TKP/M-L Hareketi.

The predecessor
of the TKP/M-L Hareketi was the TKP/M-L,
founded in 1972 by Ibrahim Kaypakkaya.
The TKP/M-L emerged as a left Maoist group in the tradition of the Communist
Party of India/Marxist-Leninist, led by Charu Mazumdar. Even at the time,
Turkey was a relatively developed dependent capitalist country which boasted
of a militant and sizable working class. With the very significant exception
of Kurdistan, peasantry in Turkey did not have a strong revolutionary tradition.
The history of Turkish republic had not witnessed to any important radical
and revolutionary mass peasant movement, apart from the national uprisings
of Kurdish peasants. Dogmatically defending the basic tenets of Maoism,
I. Kaypakkaya's TKP/M-L was for a strategy of a protracted people's war
and encircling of the cities from the countryside. During the 1972-73 period,
the TKP/M-L was defeated in its rural guerilla campaign, along with two
other radical revolutionary groups, the THKO
and the THKP-C, who chose to focus their
work in the cities, at least during the first phase of the struggle.

The THKP-C
was the strongest of the major revolutionary groups of the 1971-1973 period;
it was a revolutionary guerilla organization, close to a Castro-Guevara
line. The THKO,
the third main revolutionary group of 1971-1973 period, was also close
to a Castro-Guevara line and by far the least advanced of the three theoretically.
Although the THKP-C and the THKO too paid homage to Mao Tse-tung as a great
revolutionary, made references to him and adopted a strategy taking the
countryside as the main battleground between revolution and reaction, they
were in practice urban-oriented groups. All three of these main groups
owed their origin to the mass revolutionary movement of the youth in the
second half of the 1960's. They all opposed Soviet modern revisionism in
differing degrees (much stronger and more systematically in the case of
the TKP/M-L) and mistakenly identified this revisionism with the work in
the cities and among workers. According to these three main groups, the
Party would be built in and through armed struggle; in fact the real test
of revolutionary militancy and rejection of revisionism was seen to reside
in:

a) Considering armed struggle
as the main form of struggle all along;b) peasantry as the basic force
of the revolution; andc) the countryside as the main
field of work. After their defeat
at the hands of the military junta that came to power in March 197 1, the
remaining cadres of these organization began to reorganize, especially
following a general amnesty that led to the release of thousands of political
prisoners in 1974. This reorganizationwent
hand in hand with a critical evaluation of the experience of the 1971-1973
period and also with various splits in the ranks of these three main organizations.
The root of almost all the various radical revolutionary groups of the
1980's, 1990's and the present day, can be traced back to the TKP/M-L,
the THKO and the THKP-C.

The TKIH,
one of the main constituents of the MLKP, had split away from the majority
of the the THKP-C in 1974 and begun to call itself the THKP-C/M-L.
This split developed over the criticism of the "leftist" mass line of the
THKP-C. From 1975 on the THKP-C/M-L began to oppose Soviet modern revisionism
and embraced Maoism. In 1977 the group experienced a division; most of
the leaders and part of the cadres fell under the influence of the revisionist
theory of "Three Worlds" and left the organization to join the TIIKP
(See
End Notes Number 1).In
1979 the THKP-C/M-L rejected Maoism and stood firmly by the PLA (i.e. The
Party of Labor of Albania). During the 1977-1980 period, the THKP-C was
a militant revolutionary-democratic group, bearing the symptoms of "left"
infantile disorders, such asattempts at forming
small revolutionary unions and calls for the boycott of elections. The
urban- oriented group focused its attention on the work among workers,
youth and toilers in shantytowns.

The TDKP,
which was called theTHKO
at the time, came into being as a result of a split with the pro- Soviet
revisionist minority ofthe
THKO, called Miicadelede Birlik ('Unity
in Struggle') in 1974. Numerically much
stronger than theTHKP-C/M-L,
it followed a similar ideological evolution. This group officially rejected
the theory of "Three Worlds" in 1977 and held a conference in 1978, where
it adopted the nametheTDKP-IO.
Despite its numerical strength, theTDKP
has been one of the most inert groups in the struggle against fascism;
this group has also been notorious in concealing its defects under the
cover of revolutionary phraseology and noisy advertisement of its supposed
virtues and superiority. Mainly based among urban youth, the
TDKP-IO
too was for the formationof
small revolutionary labor unions and boycotting elections. Not content
with rejecting all forms of collaboration with other revolutionary groups,
this most conceited and sectarian group in Turkish revolutionary movement
was also renowned for heaping abuse on them. A case in point is the aggressive
attitude of theTDKP
towards the THKP-C/M-L.
Three years after it had shed its right Maoist leaders, the
THKP-C/M-L was described and evaluated by theTDKP
at its First Congress in 1980 in these words:

"The leaders of this group took
refuge in TIIKP together with as many people as they couldtake with them. As to the remnants,
they formed a small anti-Party group progressively acquiring provocative
traits."(TDKP Birinci (Kurulus) Kongresi
Beigeleri, p. 66)The year
1979 and 1980 also witnessed a series of attacks of the TDKP-IO on theTIKB,
which had split away from the THKO/TDKP-IO in 1978. The latter dubbed the
TIKB as a "counter-revolutionary fraction" and "fascist"group and incited
its militants to use violence against it. These attacks,which prompted the counter-attacks
of the TIKB, left several militants from both sides killed and wounded.
The TDKP-IO held its first and last congress in February 1980, where it
adopted a semi-Maoist and populist programme and changed its name into
the TDKP.
In this programme, Turkey was portrayed as a semi-feudal and semi-colonial
country, where agrarian revolution of the peasantry was said to be the
main content of revolution. According to this programme, the national bourgeoisie
had a stake in the democratic revolution. Therefore, revolutionary proletariat
had to try to win over the national bourgeoisie, the interests of which
were in conflict with those of "imperialism, feudal landlords and comprador
bourgeoisie"!

In 1977, the
TIKB, the nucleus of which had joined the THKO at the end of 1975, split
away fromthe organization,
criticizing its rightist mass line and the theory of "Three Worlds". In
fact the TIKB was the first, among the "pro-Albanian" groups in rejecting
the theory of "Three Worlds" and Maoism. More significantly, at its foundation
meeting, called "Advanced Militants Meeting" in 1979, the TIKB had been
the first group, who adopted a Marxist-Leninist program essentially cleansed
from Maoism. A comparatively small group, which took a definite and unequivocal
stand against all brands of revisionism, the TIKB also shared the sectarianism
and narcissism of the THKO/TDKP-IO to a certain extent, plus some of the
"left" infantile disorders of the THKP-C/M-L. The TKP/M-L,
which along with other revolutionary groups,
was able to resume its political work in 1974, experienced a division in
1976 over a discussion about the socioeconomic character of Turkey. The
pure and dogmatic Maoists, in accordance with the thesis of Mao Tse-tung,
claimed Turkey was a semi-colonial and semi-feudal country. The other wing,
calling itself the TKP/M-L Hareketi,
recognized the dependent capitalist character of Turkey. However, despite
this progress toward an essentially correct understanding of the mechanics
of socio-economic transformation of feudalism into capitalism, this group
preserved its adherence to Maoism until 1980. Accordingly, it continued
to concentrate its attention, forces and work in the countryside and among
the peasantry. In contrast
to all three of the TKIH, the TDKP and the TIKB; the TKP/M-L Hareketi had
mainly been a rural-based organization, acquiring most of its cadres from
among the population of the countryside. This structural trait of the organization
may be taken as an additional reason for its persistence on its Maoist
fallacies. During this period, the
TKP/M-L Hareketi also distanced itselffrom
the "left" opportunist mass line and strategy of "people's war", without
openly renouncing their Maoist roots. In practice, this contributed to
the strengthening of the rightist mood and habits, especially since cities
had been and were the main centers of political conflict in Turkey. The
TKP/M-L Hareketi was formed mainly in the countryside and away from these
centers, where a fierce struggle between a "civilian" fascist movement,
supported by the state and a big, but divided and multi-headed revolutionary
movement was raging. During this
period, the conciliatory and centrist habits of the TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership,
which prevented and would prevent it from taking a firm stand on most issues,
were also taking shape. That was the reason why, the modest and half-hearted
move away from Maoism, had not led to the recognition of the priority of
the cities and the historical role of the working class in a capitalist
country, such as Turkey. The TKP/M-L Hareketi would preserve its rural
orientation and reaffirm itin
its First Conference held in April 1979, though the importance of work
in the cities and among workers was underlined more and more. Remnants
of Maoist ideology and mentality lingered on much longer, despite the official
acceptance of the approach of PLA and the rejection of Maoism in 1979-1980.

The TKP/M-L
(YIO) was a far smaller group that split
away from the TKP/M-L Hareketi in 1978. Its founders argued that the TKP/M-L
Hareketi followed a rightist mass line and played down the importance of
armed action.

Here, we can
make some rough generalizations with regard to proto-communist groups at
the end of the 1970's and the beginning of 1980's:

All the various
groups involved in thefoundation
of the MLKP plus the two, which declined to join, were of Maoist or Guevarist
origin; they all had their origins in the main radical revolutionary groups
formed at the beginning of the1970's. Structurally,
they all were petty-bourgeois groups based mainly on the youth of lower
strata of urban and/or rural petty bourgeoisie. They had little
or very little, but growing ties to the working class and were shaped mainly
in the armed and violent struggle against the "civilian" fascist movement
in the second half of the 1970's. After 1974,
they all had fought against the "leftist" mass line of their predecessors
who emphasized the will, determination and courage of the vanguard; but
in the meantime they had developed some rightist traits in response to
the exaggerated emphasis on the subjective aspect of the movement. They all had
followed Enver Hoxha's and the PLA's lead in the struggle against the theory
of "Three Worlds" and against "Mao Tse-tung Thought". All of these
groups were both in the process of ideological transition from revolutionary
democratism to Marxism-Leninism and experiencing further splits toward
the end of the 1970's. It should once
again be stressed that, with the significant exception of the TIKB, these
groups had not broken definitely with Maoist ideology; all of them, including
the TIKB were laden with a petty- bourgeois style of work and attitudes
- although in differing degrees.

So,
before the military-fascist coup d'etat of September 1980, there were five
groups defending the line of the PLA:

1) TIKB, 2) TDKP, 3) THKP-C/M-L,
4) TKP/M-L Hareketi and 5) TKP/M-L (YIO) (See
End Notes Number 2).
The military coup of 12 September 1980 dealt a very heavy blow both to
the revolutionary groups and the mass movement in Turkey.
Naturally, the above mentioned groups were among the ones targeted by the
fascist junta. The sustained attack on revolutionary groups after the coup,
was not limited to physical repression, arrest of tens of thousands of
militants and sympathizers and destruction of their organizational structures;
the generals and their henchmen tried to kill the revolutionary ideals
and stand of their imprisoned enemies. Especially during the years 1980-84,
they tried to "re-educate" revolutionary militants and sympathizers through
a combination of repression and brainwashing in military prisons. In general,
this onslaught of political reaction was repulsed through the resistance
of political prisoners, which mainly took the form of hunger strikes.

This onslaught
of political reaction can not be deemed as totally unsuccessful. However,
compounded with the effect of the ebb of the mass movement of the late
1970's, this onslaught left a deep scar on the complexion and organism
of the revolutionary movement in Turkey and paved the way for the emergence
and development of a liquidationist trend. The fact that the revolutionary
movement of the time bore a petty-bourgeois character, played a decisive
rolehere.

At the end of
the 1980's and the beginning of 1990's, the downfall of the Soviet revisionist
bloc and the capitulation of socialist Albania would reinforce the drift
toward liquidationism. (See
Endnotes: Numbered 3).
The effect of this factor, however would not be felt immediately.

That was probably,
because the period between 1989 and 1991 was characterized with big actions
of the working class encompassing hundreds of thousands of people and the
successful advance of the guerillawarfare
in Kurdistan, which in turn opened the way for spontaneous mass actions
of tens of thousands of Kurdish peasants and townspeople against Turkish
fascism and colonialism. The impact of this liquidationist trend was felt
by all revolutionary and progressive groups; toward the end of the 1980's
a great many of them were reduced to almost nothingness or had simply disappeared
from the political scene. This impact was also felt by most of the above
mentioned organizations, which stood at the far end revolutionary-democratism,
had condemned Soviet and Chinese revisionism, but had not completed their
ideological transition from Maoism toMarxism-Leninism.

Of the above
mentioned groups, the TDKP
was the biggest and the worst effected by this liquidationist trend. Lacking
a genuinely illegal apparatus, the TDKP was quite easily destroyed by the
political police in 1981, almost immediately after the military-fascist
coup. In its October1989
issue, Devrimin Sesi ('Voice of the Revolution'), the illegal organ
of the TDKP conceded the fact that the TDKP leaders who were captured then,
didn't offer any resistance to the enemy andgave
it valuable information. Utterly demoralized, this group almost ceased
to exist until 1987. In a pamphlet published in February 1989 ("Struggle
Against the Right Opportunism of the 1981- 1987 Period and its Vestiges
in Organization and Work") the TDKP CC (ie The Central Committee) itself
admitted to following a right opportunist line, an anti-Leninist organizational
line, a capitulationist line with regard to the attack of political reaction
and failing into ideological disarray in the 1980's. Stooping as low as
advocating the necessity of "a European style bourgeois democracy" during
the years of reaction, the TDKP leaders attempted to hold aconference in December 1986 which was
interrupted and broken amid bitter recriminations.

A section of
the delegates opposed the TDKP leadership and in the wake of this foiled
conference reconstituted themselves as the Leninist
Wing (later it was called the EKIM
(See Endnotes: Numbered 4)).
Another section of the delegates, who split away from the TDKP would form
the TDKIH
in August 1989; the TDKIH would in turn join the TKIH in 1991 and become
part of the MLKP later.

The TDKP returned
to its well-known conceited and sectarian manner and rhetoric at a conference
it held in February 1990. In an interview published in June 1992, the CDC
of the TDKPdeclared its intention
to transform the party into a legal socialist organization
and after a period of "preparation" to neutralize and suppressprobable criticism and reaction of
the revolutionary cadres to this new path, the TDKP was legalized in 1995.
Though it tried to retain the myth and facade of an illegal organization,
the TDKP virtually was dissolved and came to be known as Emek
Partisi and later Emegin
Partisi (briefly
EMEP 'Labor Party').

The military
coup both contributed to the growth and accelerated the exposure of the
rightist trend in the TKP/M-L
Hareketi. In a pamphlet published just
after the coup, the CC of the TKP/M-L Hareketi painted a pessimistic
picture, immediately declared a tactic of retreat, allegedly for the "protection
of the vanguard". A tactical retreat was necessary; but it was unthinkable
and unacceptable for a revolutionary party not to strive to advance the
struggle of the masses. The CC of theTKP/M-L Hareketi gave a defeatist
interpretation to this tactic and denied even the possibility of workers
conducting economic strikes! In the above mentioned pamphlet it said:

"Our task is not to organize the
counter-attack of the masses. That's because, the objective conditions
to organize the struggle of the masses are not there."(Siyasal Durum, 12 EylalDarbesi ve Marksist-Leninist Taktik,
p. 20)According
to them, the revolutionary forces did not have to organize the economic
and political struggles of workers and toilers; on the contrary, they had
to wait for the masses to start their spontaneous resistance against fascism
and capitalism! Furthermore, they had to wait until that moment and protect
themselves in the meantime! The Rightist
and liquidationist stand of the TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership led to the
disruption of its local organizations and the flight of great many of its
members to Western Europe, along with the members of several revolutionary
and progressive groups. The remaining forces of the TKP/M-L Hareketi kept
on a much weakened struggle under difficult conditions. In 1983-1984,
the TKP/M-L Hareketi experienced a division and a struggle between aliquidationist wing and a revolutionary
wing. After the partial defeat of the former, the groupheld
its First Extraordinary Conference in 1986. The Conference helped the group
to put some order into its own house and resume political work. But here,
only an inadequate self-criticism was made and a half-hearted stand was
taken against liquidationism, the roots of which were far from being exposed.
The blame for past mistakes was put on the shoulders of the opportunist
CC and the question was considered solved! This was a delusion, since both
sides to the discussion bore the same responsibility for the opportunist
mistakes of the past. So, the underlying problem lived on.

An example of persistence of
right opportunism was provided by the attitude taken toward Kurdish guerilla
struggle.

After its establishment
in 1978, the PKK
had followed an extremely sectarian line and especially in 1979 and 1980
it had launched physical attacks against almost all other revolutionary
groups, including the TKP/M-L Harcketi and various Kurdish nationalist
groups. Overreacting to this line of the PKK,
which had led to the death and wounding of dozens and maybe hundreds of
people from different groups, in 1979 the TKP/M-L Hareketi CC dubbed the
PKK as an "Apoist fascist gang", and argued that the struggle against
the PKK was a part and an extension of the struggle against the Turkish
state. This, of course, was not correct. The TKP/M-L Hareketi CC stuck
to a somewhat watered down version of this subjective assessment of the
PKK, even after the beginning of guerilla warfare in1984
and tenaciously maintained this position until May 1991, despite warnings
and criticisms from inside the organization. This was almost the mechanical
opposite of the sycophantic attitude it would adopt after 1991. As to the
MLKP, following in the footsteps of the TKP/M-L Hareketi, itwould adopt this latter position, in
violation of the Programme and the directives of the Unity Congress, as
shall be seen below.

It is to be noted that, the 1986 Conference did not even attempt to tackle
the problem of the "influence of Maoism" on the programmatic views ofthe TKP/M-L Hareketi. (This
organization did not have an official document entitled "Programme" until
its fourth conference in 1991.) The TKP/M-L Hareketi would continue to
ignore this "structural defect" and would in a sense, objectively strive
to preserve its Maoist burdenduring the next eight years. It did
not address this question in its third, fourth and fifth conferences held
respectively in 1989, 1991 and 1993. One may surmise that, the
TKP/M-L Hareketi would continue to keep this
question in the deep freeze, if the unity work had not compelled it to
discuss and "solve" this problem in the run-up to the Unity Congress in
September 1994.

In contrast to
the TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership, the THKP-C/M-L's
initial response to the coup, was much
more cool-headed and correct. But, as time passed by, it also had to fight
against a liquidationist tendency that arose in its ranks. This occurred
especially following a police operation in 1982. Though somewhat weakened,
the THKP-C/M-L continued its political work after this police operation.
It held a General Meeting in May 1984, where it changed its name into the
TKIH.
The General Meeting analysed the political situation in Turkey and the
world and condemned the liquidationist trend and right opportunism, both
in its own ranks and in the ranks of revolutionary movement in general.
Further blows of the police, however, curtailed the work of the TKIH. So
after this, it could not really reconstitute itself and reorganize political
work until the end of 1987. Though, quite smaller than the TKP/M-L Hareketi,
the TKIH was less burdened with opportunist prejudices and mentality, less
inclined to tolerate opportunist deviations, more militant and moreurban-oriented and had a better understanding
of the role of the working class than its future partner.

While
keeping the substance of its power and influence, the military junta had
formally handed over the government over to Turgut Ozal's ANAP ('Motherland
Party') following the general elections of November 1983. The outbreak
of a guerilla warfare of Kurdish people led bythe PKKin August 1984, the first stirrings of progressive student
youth in 1985 and the beginning of first important workers' struggles in
1987, were harbingers of a new phase in the political landscape of Turkey.

These factors
contributed to the creation of an environment more favorable for the reorganization
of revolutionary groups, who had not expired their potential to make a
fresh start. The period of 1987-1991 would witness an ascent in the mass
struggles of workers, youth and Kurdish people and the inability of fascist-colonialist
state to check the rise of working class movement, to contain the growth
of the Kurdish guerilla movement and destroy it.

One of the effects
of the period of political reaction was the weakening of sectarianism
and narrow group mentality. The fascist junta had targeted all revolutionary
and even progressive groups and compelled, especially their imprisoned
cadres to act together. Arising out of the petty-bourgeois nature of the
revolutionary movement, this narrow group mentality had led to the poisoning
of the relations between various group. So much so, that during the 1970's,
they, had at times gone as far as engaging in armed clashes among themselves.
That was one of the reasons why, under the circumstances of fascist terror
before 1980, even groups who shared similar views,such
as those who defended the PLA and opposed Soviet and Chinese revisionism
could not come together, let alone establish a united front against fascism. So, the partial
weakening of sectarianism was not a wholly negative development, since
it allowed revolutionary cadres belonging to different groups to, at least
listen to each other, enter a period of dialogue and think about their
individual and/or common problems; it assisted the formation of a culture
of common action and united front. But, during the second half of the 1980's,
in an atmosphere of tactical defeat and liquidationism, this new mood signified
mainly a move in the direction of liberalism,
a lessening of self-confidence and a growing inclination to blur ideological
boundaries. The fall of the Soviet revisionist block and of socialist Albania
reinforced this trend and especially fostered opportunist illusions; a
considerable number of people began to argue that "former divisions between
various trends in the revolutionary movement could be overcome". This trend
would strike a chord with the TKP/M-L Hareketi, already used to compromising
opposing points of view and maintaining and preserving its own burden of
Maoism.

In this atmosphere,
some of these five groups began to think about and discuss the question
of "unity of communist forces". The division among "pro-Albanian" groups
became to be seen as less reasonable and less defensible. At the end of
1987, the TKIH had declared itself in favor of unity with the TIKB, the
TDKP and the TKP/M-L Hareketi, provided that important ideological and
organizational hurdles were overcome. In 1989 the TKTH and the TKP/M-L
Hareketi issued a Joint Declaration
calling for the "unity of communist groups". In
March 1990, a joint committee was established to advance the unity process
amongthe
TKIH, the TKP/M-L Hareketi and the TDKIH, a
relatively very small group. The establishment
of the MLKP-K would be the result of efforts
aimed at uniting these groups,which
lasted from 1989 to 1994. In the meantime the TDKIH would join the TKIH
in September 1991. During this period, the TKIH and the TKP/M-L Hareketi
and especially the latter more than oncecalled
on the TDKP and the TIKB to participate in the unity process, but they
were each time rebuffed.

The liberal approach
of TKP/M-L Hareketi CC had already become salient at the time. Instead
of pointing to the real differences and aiming to develop a principled
ideological struggle over these differences to arrive at unity, it did
its best to minimize these differences and advocated a sort of amnesty
for all mistakes, past and present. The TIKB
andthe
TDKP, however, declined to take part in the work for unity,
although their objections differed to a certain extent. They considered
only themselves as communist and therefore did not have such a problem
in their agenda. They took this drive to be an effort at unification among
opportunist groups. The TIKB criticized this proposal as a liberal, liquidationist
and an unprincipled attempt, a step toward unity among some groups, who
lacked enough confidence in their own strength. It advised them and especially
the TKP/M-L Hareketi, to critically assess their own past practical line
and theoretical stands and fight against the heavy burden of opportunism,
Maoism and liquidationism on their shoulders. The TIKB argued that seemingly
similar positions of these groups, rooted in their proximity to the PLA
meant nothing, as long as they did not follow a consistently communist
line and take a definite stand against all brands of revisionism. It should
be conceded that, despite its sectarian approach and arrogant language
of its criticism, the TIKB's evaluation of the unity process has been correct
and essentially confirmed by the experience of the MLKP. As to the leaders
of the TDKP, which had returned to their habitual sectarianism after they
had put some order into their house after 1987, they went further and described
this unity process as an anti-TDKP step. According to them, this unity
worktargeted, and was
designed especially to destroy the TDKP itself, the "only party of the
working class"!

The effort toward
unity was not successful during the first phase which lasted until 1991.
Itwas in limbo between
1991 and 1993, due to lack of trust and inexperience, but more so due to
the conservative approach of the TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership toward its
Maoist past. The drive for unity gained further momentum after a joint
meeting of the delegates from two groups in April 1993. The delegates decided
to resume the work for unity. This decision was ratified by the Second
Congress ofthe
TKIH and Fifth General Conference (or Congress) ofthe TKP/M-L Hareketi,
both held in the autumn of 1993. After the congresses, a Committee
for the Organization of Unity Congress
was established to coordinate the unity effort. This committee arranged
aninternal discussion
in which members and sympathizers from two groups would participate. For
this purpose, an internal discussion journal called Birlik Iradesi ('Will
for Unity') was started and continued for some time. Up to the time of
the Unity Congress, 26 issues of the journal had been published. However,
it should be noted here that, due to the low level of general theoretical
development of the cadres of the involved groups, articles published in
the journal were notequal
to the task they were expected to fulfill. This was to address the main
sticking point - which was to clear up the remnants of Maoism; and moreover,
to provide cadres with a somewhat profound perception of the problems of
revolution in Turkey, and to lay a firm Marxist-Leninist theoretical basis
for the new party.

At the First
Party and Unity Conference held in September
1995, one year after the establishment of the MLKP-K, the far smaller the
TKP/M-L (YIO)
also joined the united organization, which thereafter changed its name
into the MLKP.
This group had been forced to cease its political work after the coup in
1980 and was almost totally destroyed and immobilized. It was not able
to resume political work until the end of the 1980's. The participation
of the TKP/M-L (YIO), who had been burdened with a background similar to
that of the TKP/M-L Hareketi, hardened the Maoiststrain
in the structure of the MLKP and probably contributed to its future ideological
confusion and organizational stagnation.

The establishment
of the MLKP-K and its transformation into the MLKP, one year later was
greeted with relief, hope and high spirits, not only among the sympathizers
and supporters of its constituent groups, but also among a great many progressive
people. After all, Turkey had been a paradise of sectarianism as far as
revolutionary movement went, where even groups very close to each other
ideologically and politically could not cooperate, let alone unite. Apart
from the objective need to unite against fascism, there really did exist
a strong longing for the "unity ofthe
left." Progressive sections of the people were exasperated with the extreme
fragmentation of the revolutionary movement during the second half of the
1970's. The fact that they lived through the white terror of the junta
period, had strengthened their demand for unity or at least for a united
front and common action of revolutionary forces. And, not unjustly, the
MLKPhas frequently underlined
its contribution to the advancement of the idea and practice of unity.

It is a fact that the MLKP has
dealtcertain blows to sectarianism and promoted the idea unity
among revolutionary forces.

Besides and what
is more important, some hard successes emerged in the work of the MLKP
following unity. In March 1995, it played an important role in the glorious
resistance of the Gazi people against
the armed repression of the police in Istanbul, in the March-May 1995 period
it organized the campaign to find the remains of Hasan
Ocak, who was abducted and later killed
by political police. The MLKP successfully utilized the energy released
through this campaign to develop two important
initiatives: holding of a "Congress
Against Disappearances in Police Custody"andthe formation ofthe "Saturday Mothers' Movement".
It also mobilized a significant following during the May the Ist demonstrations
of 1995 and 1996 and led or actively participated in some strikes. Organizational
fusion of two groups had proceeded without considerable friction. The KGO,
the youth organization of the MLKP proved to be a militant and strong organization
and a center of attraction for revolutionary youth.

On the other
hand, the long standing extreme sectarian and almost openly anti-Marxist
opposition of the overseas organization of the TKP/M-L Hareketi, headed
by a single careerist person, was defeated mainly through the accomplishment
of the unity in Turkey, plus patient ideological struggle and political
persuasion. The ideological baggage of this local organization, frantically
opposing the work for unity, had consisted of a mixture of the most backward
interpretation of the views of the TKP/M-L Hareketi (bordering on pure
Maoism) and a sentimental cult of I. Kaypakkaya, with a form of foquismo.
Some time after unity, the remnants of this local organization would
try to constitute themselves into a caricature of another "revolutionary
group."

It should be
noted that, different revolutionary groups, such as
the DHKP-C, the TDKP, the TIKB, the TKP/M-L(See
Endnotes: Numbered 5)., the EKIM
etc. met the establishment of the MLKP with a sort of inimical skepticism.
After the struggle to isolate the careerist and sectarian elements in the
overseas organization of the TKP/M-L Hareketi, and to win the majority
of its cadres was successfully ended; some of these other groups went as
far as protecting and passively supporting the extremely small anti-Party
group, that had come into existence. There appeared to be no rational explanation
for this attitude of theirs, apart from the petty-bourgeois spirit of sectarian
rivalry. The fact that the MLKP at times utilized mistaken methods of struggle
against this tiny group could, naturally not justify thisattitude of theirs.

All these developments
reinforced optimism both in the ranks of the MLKP and outside. In fact
the MLKP was becoming and for a certain period of time did come a center
of hope and attraction for revolutionary cadres and sympathizers; especially
for those who were disenchanted and frustrated with the narrow-mindedness,
sectarianism, stagnation and gradual fossilization and even degeneration
of significant sections of the traditional revolutionary movement. Unfortunately,
these successes accompanying the first year of the life of the Party, created
a mentality of "dizziness with success" and served to hide its structural
weaknesses. Speaking of the positive or negative effects of tactical successes
Stalin had said:

"Speaking generally, tactical
successes prepare for strategic successes... But cases occur when a tactical
success frustrates or postpones, strategic success. In view of this, it
is necessary, in such cases, to forego tactical successes."(Works,
Vol. 5, p. 66)There were three very important
problems or defects in the building of this new structure, which would
doom the MLKP experiment to failure.

These interrelated problems and
defectswere not fully
understood at the time. What was worse, these would not be addressed later
and would cause the gradual degeneration of the MLKP. And that happened
despite repeated warnings ,and criticisms made by some cadres of the Party.

What were these three defects?Firstly,
All of the constituents of the MLKP and
therefore the united party itself had very few ties to the working class. What was much
more important, however, was the fact that the Party didnot seem to grasp fully the historical
role of the working class both in the democratic and socialist revolutions,
in overthrowing capitalism and building socialism. Unfortunately, this
was so despite the declared official position of the Party. Lenin once
said:"The chief thing in the doctrine
of Marx is that it brings out the historic role of the proletariat as the
builder of socialist society".(The Historical Destiny of the
Doctrine of Karl Marx, Collected Works, Vol. 18, p. 582)Lenin
also had pointed to the decisive importance of the fusion of workers' movement
and socialist movement. In his article, "The Urgent Tasks of Our Movement",
he had said:"In every country there has been
a period in which the labor movement existed separately from the socialist
movement, each going its road; and in every country this state of isolation
weakened both the socialist movement and the labor movement. Only the combination
of socialism with the labor movement in each country created a durable
basis for both the one and the other."(Selected Works, Vol.
2, p. 11) In our country
this period of isolation had lasted too long and done great amount of damage
to both. Some cadres taking part in the unity struggle were aware of this
basic structural defect of the revolutionary movement and therefore had
pressed for its acknowledgement. The documents of the Unity Congress had
said:"... the primary aim of our strategic
plan is to become a real center of attraction in the ranks of the working
class, to build the communist party and create a revolutionary workers'
movement. This is our first priority. All the other problems of strategy
can be solved in recognition of the priority of this factor."Besides the MLKP Programme had openly
stressed the class character of the communist party and had said:"4... Communist movement is a
conscious expression, an expression enlightened by the theory of scientific
socialism, of working class movement, which tends to solve the contradiction
between the social character of production and the private ownership of
the means ofproduction." But time would show
that, this recognition was not sufficiently profound; that petty-bourgeois
ideology, mentality and style of work were all very alive and as time passed
by, would overwhelm the Marxist-Leninist element in the Party.

That was the
main reason why the above mentioned tactical successes played such a harmful
role and objectively assisted in the deformation of the strategic line
of the Party. Despite its Programme and the directives formulated at the
Unity Congress, the MLKP was almost instinctively drawn toward political
work among non-proletarian sections of the people, that is toward work
among youth, urban semi-proletariat and Kurdish people, instead of the
working class. Petty-bourgeois rush and haste and longing to win success
and following prevailed over systematic and patient daily work to win the
working class and its advanced sections.

There were some
other factors, pushing the Party away from the working class.First
of all, the Party was under obligation to interfere and take part in the
current struggle against fascism, imperialism and colonialism and especially
to support the Kurdish people whose blood was being profusely shed.Secondly,
the Party leadership also felt itself under moral pressure to show its
sympathizers and revolutionary public opinion in general, that MLKP was
something more than the simple combination of its constituents, that it
was worth the long and protracted effort to create it. These, however,
were only secondary factors contributing to this loss of direction. Inthe final analysis, it was the petty-bourgeois
ideology and habits of the cadres and
especially of the leaders of MLKP that were to blame for the drift toward
work among petty-bourgeois strata and petty-bourgeois revolutionary democratism.
No tactical consideration can justify the loss or relinquishment of the
strategic orientation of a communist party.

The reason for
this diversion was anything but accidental; it was mainly due to the deep-rooted
ideological confusion reigning in the
MLKP and its predecessors, especially the TKP/M-L Hareketi. The Party could
not focus its attention firmly and unequivocally on the spontaneous fight
of the working class against the bourgeoisie; it could not participate
in all working class struggles on a daily basis; it could not impart socialist
class consciousness to the class and move forward systematically to win
first the vanguard and later the great masses of the working class. Far
from treading on this path, the Party was not even really aware of its
task to prepare and steadfastly apply a long-range plan to advance the
anti-capitalist struggle and enlightenment of workers and to elevate itself
to the position of leadership of the class.

Naturally a Communist
Party will not and can not reject to do political and organizationalwork among other sections of the people.
However, a genuine party of the working class should and will concentrate
its attention among the workers and relegate work among the non-proletarian
sections of the people to a secondary position, especially during the first
stage of its foundation and consolidation. Such a party does not have the
right to forget the fact that, without a solid basis among workers and
firm ties to the class, and especially to its politically advanced section,
achievements and even "brilliant" achievements among petty-bourgeois strata
will come to nothing.

The MLKP experiment
has once more proved that, such achievements always carry the risk of distracting
the attention of the Party from the working class and contribute to the
growth or regeneration of petty-bourgeois ideology, mentality and style
of work. Furthermore, with the MLKP such a risk was much greater. Why?
Because,

a) unity between revolutionary
movement in ourcountry,
including the MLKP and its predecessors and the working class movement
had been very weak historically;b) The MLKP's ideological credentials
and positions were far from being sufficiently firm;c) despite its declarations as
to its class nature, the structural composition of the Party was petty-bourgeois;
andd) a relatively strong international
communist movement with the ability to correct the strategic errors of
national communist parties did not exist anymore. The failure of the
MLKP leadership to recognize the priority, the historical role and the
special place of the working class can also be seen from the content of
the propaganda conducted in its legal and illegal organs. Until recently,
these organs had almost always neglected even to mention the word "working
class" or "proletariat" and instead, preferred
to talk of "toilers" or "masses".
The distinction between the former and the latter terms is, of course,
one of the fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism. In his "Report on Party Unity
and the Anarcho-Syndicalist Deviation" Lenin said:"Anyone who has read Marx and
Engels will recall that in all their works they ridicule those who talk
about producers, the people, working people in general. There are no working
people or workers in general; there are either small proprietors who own
the means of production, and whose mentality and habits are capitalistic
- and they can not be anything else - or wage-workers with an altogether
different cast of mind, wage-workers in large-scale industry, who stand
in antagonistic contradiction to the capitalists and are ranged in struggle
against them."(Collected Works, Vol.
32, p. 251) Another related
mistake taken over from the TKP/M-L Hareketi was the catchword portraying
Turkey as"a
country of petty bourgeoisie." It was
true that petty bourgeoisie occupied a large or maybe the largest section
of Turkish society. This way of putting things, however, was totally irrelevant
and anti-Marxist; it was a reflection of the MLKP leadership's innate tendency
to underestimate the role, strength and priority of the working class.
In passing, it should be noted that this catchword itself did not conform
to reality. In Turkey, the working class and other wage earners were far
from a being a small minority; toward the end of the 1990's, they represented
at least as big a proportion of the population, as the petty bourgeoisie.
What was much more important, however, was the fact that, in Turkey, as
in almost all capitalist countries, the urban and rural petty bourgeoisie
had proved themselves far less active politically and far weaker than the
working class and it could not be otherwise. In his article, "The Constituent
Assembly Elections and the Dictatorship of the Proletariat", Lenin said:"The strength of the proletariat
in any capitalist country is far greater than the proportion it represents
of the total population. That is because the proletariat economically dominates
the centre and the nerve of the entire economic system of capitalism, and
also because the proletariat expresses economically and politically the
real interests of the overwhelming majority of the working people under
capitalism."(Collected Works,
Vol. 30, p. 274) The Programme
and the basic documents of the MLKP had based themselves on this Marxist-Leninist
premise and on the essentially correct analysis of socioeconomic development
and recent history of our country, which were in harmony with this premise.

That is, they
had taken into account the level of development of capitalism and historical
weakness of the revolutionary tradition of peasantry. Furthermore, they
had taken into account the prone-ness of Turkish petty bourgeoisie to fall
under the influence of political reaction. Therefore, the Party had declared
the contradiction betweenthe proletariat and the
bourgeoisie to be the basic contradiction in our country; the MLKP was
dutybound to concentrate its attention and forces
on the working class and resist all attempts to distract it from this basic
direction.

Secondly,
the MLKP leadership proved itself unable or
unwilling to clearly recognize the correct relationship between the democratic
and socialist tasks of the revolution. The basic documents
of the Party had stated that Turkey was at the stage of democratic revolution,
which could only be led by the working class. Far from denying the burning
character of a series of important democratic tasks, these texts have called
on the Party to fight for the establishment of the hegemony of the working
class in the democratic revolution, to work for the execution of these
democratic tasks thoroughly, radically and with a socialist perspective
and to declare itself for uninterrupted revolution. That is, the Party
was not for lingering at the stage of democratic revolution; it would strive
for the immediate transformation of the democratic into the second and
socialist stage of the revolution.

The Party was
obliged
to tell the workers never to neglect the democratic tasks of the revolution,
and always support actively and participate in all revolutionary-democratic
popular movements. But it also had to warn
the working class against glorifying or exaggerating the democratic revolution
itself, since even the most far reaching democratic transformations would
not end capitalism and the class domination of proletariat by the bourgeoisie
and the exploitation of the former by the latter. Exaggerating and extolling
democratic tasks of the revolution inexorably leads a party away from socialism
and lands it in the mire of bourgeois democracy and capitalism. Opposing
this reformist viewpoint, the Programme of the Party had said:

"31- The communist movement considers
the struggle for democracy an extremely important, but always and under
all circumstances a subsidiary task; a transitory task to be subordinated
to the air of socialist revolution. For this reason, while on the one hand
supporting Kurdish national, democratic peasant, democratic women's and
other general democratic people's movements and defending their demands,
on the other hand, it unites Kurdish workers, agricultural workers and
woman workers in class organizations separately from the general democratic
movement. Revolutionary proletariat subordinates struggle for reforms to
struggle for revolution and treats democratic tasks with a socialist perspective."The
Programme and the directives of the Unity Congress stated clearly that
Turkey was a dependent capitalist country, where the contradiction between
the bourgeoisie and the proletariat was the basic contradiction.

Yet the MLKP
leadership acted as if the Programme and thedirectives
of the Unity Congress did not exist; it acted as if the Party was an ordinary
petty-bourgeois and populist revolutionary-democratic party fighting in
a country where the basic contradiction was the one between people in general
and fascism and/or imperialism. It concentrated its attention almost entirely
on democratic tasks, that is the struggle for political democracy and national
liberation.

The Menshevist
and democratist line of the MLKP leadership showed itself in a much moreglaring manner in the case of the Kurdish
national question. Here, right from the
start, it followed a tailist policy and kowtowed to the leadership of the
Kurdish national movement; that is, it restricted the Party's role almost
solely to supporting the just demands of the oppressed nation and its petty-bourgeois
leadership. Besides, the Party leadership followed a progressively more
conciliatory line concerning Kurdish nationalism, which as time passed
began bordering onunconditional
support and outright flattery. Disgracefully caving in to the PKK leadership
and in accordance with its inherent tendency to worship spontaneity, the
CC of the MLKP underestimatedthe revolutionary potential of Turkish
working class and toilers and went as
far as blaming and censuring them, especially for not actively supporting
Kurdish national movement. It failed to criticize firmly and openly the
growing flirtations of the PKK leadership
with imperialists and certain sections of Turkish bourgeoisie;
further, the Party leadership failed to recognize and therefore expose
the growing reformism and approaching treason
of A. Ocalan, who, as far back as 1995,
had become ready to sabotage and sell the PKK in return for a few crumbs.

Under such circumstances,
it was not surprising to see the CC of the MLKP violating the Programme
and distorting the directives of the Unity Congress in quite an arbitrary
fashion. In fact, right from the start, it had neglected its task to enlighten
all workers of all nationalities in an anti-capitalist and internationalist
spirit and to strive to unite them in common, single working class organizations;
it had neglected its task to organize Kurdish
workers independently of PKK, that is, of Kurdish national movement.
In fact, the MLKP leadership did not even dare to assert the communists'
inalienable right to do that. This meant a covert approval of the "right"
of petty-bourgeois national liberation movement, that is of Kurdish national
bourgeoisie to dominate Kurdish workers and toilers ideologically, politically
and organizationally; this meant renunciation of proletariat's right to
establish its hegemony in the democratic revolution in general and over
the national movement in particular. This was a Menshevist
position and was totally against the principles of Marxism-Leninism, as
it was against the letter and spirit of the Programme of the MLKP and basic
directives of the Unity Congress. Lenin had told the following in his "Preliminary
Draft of Theses on the National and Colonial Question" as far back as 1920:

"Fifth, that it is necessary to
wage a determined struggle against painting the bourgeois- democratic liberation
trend in backward countries in Communist colours; the Communist International
must support the bourgeois-democratic national movements in colonial and
backward countries only on condition that the elements of future proletarian
parties existing in all backward countries, which are not merely Communist
in name, shall be grouped together and trained to appreciate their special
tasks, viz., the tasks of fighting the bourgeois-democratic movements within
their own nations; the Communist International must enter into a temporary
alliance with bourgeois democracy in colonial and backward countries, but
must not merge with it, and must unconditionally preserve the independence
of the proletarian movement even in its most rudimentary form;..."(Selected Works, Vol. 10,
pp. 236-237)The Programme
of the Party and the documents of the Unity Congress were in accordance
with this Leninist approach. In fact, underlining the decisive nature of
the revolutionary struggle of the working class for the long- range and
only genuine solution to the Kurdish question, these documents said:"Revolutionary advance of proletariat
is necessary, not only for preventing the danger of defeat Kurdish national
liberation movement has been facing; it shall also determine the fate and
the future of Turkey... Revolutionary movement of proletarian masses will
determine the development of the anti-imperialist democratic revolution
that has burst forth over the Kurdish national question, which requires
a burning and immediate solution."(Birlik Kongresi Belgeleri,
pp. 115-16)Needless
to add, the MLKP leadership did not act according to these precepts of
the Unity Congress. As time went by, the tailist nature of the Kurdish
policy of the CC of the MLKP and itssubservience
to the leadership of the PKK became deeper and acquired a more humiliating
and damaging character. Even after A. Ocalan,
the leader of the PKK, openly and shamefully capitulated to Turkish fascism
at the court and called for the cessation of armed struggle and in fact
of all struggle, against Turkish colonialism, the MLKP CC still hesitated
and vacillated before condemning him openly.

The pro-Kurdish
nationalist and tailist policy of the MLKP leadership contributed to the
distortion and degeneration of the united front policy of the Party as
well. In 1998, the MLKP played a very important role in the formation of
the BDGP,
a block of a number of revolutionary and progressive forces. This block
included the PKK, the TKP (M-L) and the
TKP/M-L plus some extremely weak groups
trying to maintain themselves by leaning on and extolling the PKK. Right
from the start, the MLKP leadership attributed a very exaggerated importance
to this bloc; time and again it argued that the BDGP would prove to be
a different experiment in united front work, that it would be a permanent
and long-range weapon in the fight against fascism and colonialism. But,
it was obvious from its inception that the BDGP was doomed to failure.
Why? Because, the main force in the BDGP
was the PKK, whose leadership had gone
a long way in the direction of capitulation and treason at the time of
this platform's foundation.(See
Endnotes: Numbered 6). At least, starting
from 1995, if not before, the PKK leadership was continuously underlining
its aim to come to terms with Turkish reaction and imperialism in return
for the basest of democratic reforms, such as the recognition of the national
identity of Kurdish people; it was systematically trying to assure them
of the PKK's "peaceful"
intentions and its readiness and eagerness to cooperate in maintaining
"stability." So, how could this caricature of a united front do, apart
from acting at best as a sort of "solidarity committee with the PKK" and
at worst as an instrument of counter-revolutionary reformism and liquidation?
Who, apart from utter simpletons and degenerate opportunists could expect
orappear to expect such
a formation to fight for the overthrow of the fascist and colonialist regime
and for a people's revolution? Therefore, the MLKP leadership was totally
wrong and unjustified in trumpeting the so-called virtues and superiority
of this particular initiative.

But, the MLKP
leadership was not content with spreading false hopes and illusions about
this non- revolutionary and reformist structure; it insisted on staying
in it until afterA. Ocalan declared his open capitulation
to Turkish fascism at court. And that was
done despite some correct warnings and heavy criticism from inside the
Party. What is more, it tried to portray this initiative as a means "for
the creation of militant working class movement!" In the August-September
1998 issue of Partinin Sesi ('Voice of the Party'), the illegal
organ of the MLKP, following lines were written:

"The BDGP is also an instrument
for the working class to play its leading role in the anti-imperialist,
anti-chauvinist struggle and a medium for the creation of a militant working
class movement to promote this purpose... The concerned, progressive, revolutionary
and advanced sections of the class are duty bound to display the adroitness
to avail themselves of this opportunity." On the other hand,
the Party leadership violated the most basic requirements of a communist
party. In the"The Conditions of Affiliation to the Communist International",
it was said:"1. Everyday propaganda and agitation
must bear a genuinely Communist character and correspond to the programme
and decisions of the Communist International. All organs of the press belonging
to the party must be edited by reliable Communists who have proved theirloyalty to the cause of the proletarian
revolution. The dictatorship of the proletariat must not be discussed simply
as if it were a fashionable formula learned by rote; propaganda for it
must be carried on in such a way that every rank-and-file working man and
working woman, every soldier and peasant, shall see that the necessity
for it arises from the vital facts which are systematically reported in
our press day after day..."(Lenin, Selected Works, Vol.
10, p. 201) Almost openly violating
this dictum of Lenin's, the publishing house of the Party have been putting
out a lot of non-Marxist or even non-revolutionary material, which can
not be said to be contributing to the revolutionary education of cadres
and sympathizers. A similar observationcan
be made with regard to the cultural center of the Party. Here petty-bourgeois
democrat and reformist intellectuals are provided with a forum to express
their opinions and theses, whereas the Marxist-Leninist voice of the Party
is seldom heard and its right to criticize bourgeois democrats seldom exercised.
And all these are done in the name of "unity" and "united front"! It is
true that, a communist party shall and may work together with all anti-fascist
forces, including petty- bourgeois democratic and reformist intelligentsia,
especially under conditions of fascist or reactionary dictatorship and
where a great many democratic tasks remain unaccomplished. But, such a
united front policy will not and cannot place the proletarian vanguard
under an obligation to submit to its temporary allies, to refrain from
stating its own Marxist assessment of events and developments and to impose
a sort of censorship upon itself. On the contrary, revolutionary proletariat
is duty bound to follow a long-range policy of establishing its ideological
hegemony in the cultural field, including petty-bourgeois democratic intelligentsia.

Furthermore,
Lenin considered the defence of the dictatorship of the proletariat the
main criterion to distinguish between Marxists and all sorts of defenders
of propertied classes, "the touchstone on which the real understanding
and recognition of Marxism is to be tested". In his famous pamphlet, The
State And Revolution Lenin said:

"He who recognizes only the class
struggle is not yet a Marxist; it may turn out that he has not yet gone
beyond the bounds of bourgeois thinking and bourgeois politics. To confine
Marxism to the doctrine of the class struggle means curtailing Marxism,
distorting it, reducing it to something acceptable to the bourgeoisie.
Only he is a Marxist who extends the recognition of the class struggle
to the recognition of the dictatorship of the proletariat. That is what
constitutes the most profound difference between the Marxist and the ordinary
petty (as well as big) bourgeois. This is the touchstone on which the real
understanding and recognition of Marxism is to betested.
And it is not surprising that when the history of Europe brought the working
class face to face with this question as a practical issue, not only all
the opportunists and reformists but all the 'Kautskyites' (people who vacillate
between reformism and Marxism) proved to be miserable philistines and petty-bourgeois
democrats who repudiate the dictatorship of the proletariat".(Marx, Engels, Marxism, pp.
405-6)The MLKP did not
conform to this criterion. Its legal and illegal organs did not perform
this vital and primary task; they did not conduct "genuinely Communist"
propaganda and agitation and restricted themselves with democratic, that
is anti-fascist, anti-imperialist and anti-colonialist propaganda and agitation.
The education of workers and other toilers about the necessity of socialism
and the dictatorship of the proletariat was almost "forgotten". But, how
can a party a follow a Marxist-Leninist line without educating workers
and other toilers in the spirit of socialism and the dictatorship of the
proletariat? Was not this the line of petty-bourgeoisrevolutionary
democratism cloaked with some Marxist-Leninist formulas? And was not this
a line of khvostism, of reformism aimed at holding workers inside
the boundaries of capitalism? Yes, it definitely was. In his "The Foundations
of Leninism", Stalin said:"The theory of worshipping spontaneity
is decidedly opposed to lending the spontaneous movement consciousness
and system. It is opposed to the idea of the Party marching at the head
of the working class, of the Party raising the masses to the level of class
consciousness, of the Party leading the movement... The theory of spontaneity
is the theory of belittling the role of the conscious element in the movement,
the ideology of 'khvostism' - the logical basis of all opportunism."(Problems of Leninism,
p. 16)And exactly
such has been the nature of the political and organizational work conducted
bythe cadres of the
Party among workers. An observer of the practical work of the MLKP or a
reader of its publications during the period following its establishment,
will not be able to perceive any will, effort or plan to elevate workers
to the level of the class conscious vanguard of the proletariat and impart
socialist class consciousness to them. A case in point
is the 366 page long documents of the Second Congress of the Party held
in August 1997. In these documents, the CC of the Party had devoted 86
pages to describing international situation, but less than 10 pages to
the situation of and the work among working class andpublic servants! Moreover, almost all
of this little space had been filled with the most superficial description
of the situation of the class, the like of which one could easily find
on the pages of ordinary issues of the Party's legal and illegal publications.
In this pitiful document, theleadership
had neither attempted to make an analysis of the working class movement,
nor to provide a critical evaluation of the work of the Party during the
three year period following the First Congress. This meant that the cadres
or sympathizers of the Party, advanced workers and toilers and progressive
public opinion could not learn anything about the state of the MLKP's work
among workers and for that matter its work among youth, Kurdish people
etc. by reading this supposedly most authoritative document. Documents
of the Second Congress also had not put forward any concrete plan for the
future work of the Party in the working class. This approach was, of course,
nothing but accidental. It faithfully reflected the Party's non-Marxist
line, orientation and style of work.

Since September
1994, Party's committees, its publications etc. have provided information
about the situation and actions of the working class, they have exposed
the bourgeoisie, the state apparatus, trade-union bureaucrats and reformists.
But, this has, definitely not been done in a consistently revolutionary
and an anti-capitalist spirit. The Party has not systematically analyzed
the experience of the working class gained in its struggle against the
bourgeoisie; it has not prepared serious plans or proposed concrete measures
to advance the struggle of the workingclass
against capitalism. What is more, it has not taken part systematically
in the daily struggle of workers against capitalism and not strived to
educate them on the basis of their own experience. The task of a communist
party could not be restricted to recording and describing the situation
of the working class. Therefore, it is fair to say that, despite participating
and providing leadership in various strikes and other actions of the working
class from time to time, the MLKP has been worshipping spontaneity in the
working class movement and following a khvostist and in the final
analysis a reformist line.(See
Endnotes: Numbered 7).

Thirdly,the MLKP leadership did not really understand
the vital importance of definitely and unequivocally breaking with all
brands of opportunism and revisionism and of cleansing itself of all remnants
of bourgeois democratic ideology and of embracing Marxism-Leninism firmly.

Between 1989
and 1994, that is during the period of the formation of the Party, one
of the most important sticking points was the disagreement over the assessment
of I. Kaypakkaya, the
Maoist founder of the TKP/M-L and TKP/M-L Hareketi's own past. The TKP/M-L
Hareketi for years had tried to portray both the patently Maoist I. Kaypakkaya,
and its own mainly Maoist 1972-1979 period - as "Marxist-Leninist". That,
of course, was a totally mistaken view.

At the root of
the problem, lay the centrist and eclectisist tradition of the TKP/M-L
Hareketi leadership, which instinctively drove it to attempt to tread a
middle way between Marxism-Leninism and Maoism. When it had rejected Maoism
as a brand of revisionism in 1979-1980, the TKP/M-L Hareketi had not reviewed,
or rather postponed to review its past in the light of this ideological
step forward. And it would continue to postpone this thorny problem. In
the meantime, it had created a fantastic myth, according to which I. Kaypakkaya's
pure Maoism and its own mainly Maoist line were in harmony with Marxism-Leninism!
Gravitation of the successors of the THKP-C and the THKO toward Maoism
after 1974 had assisted to reinforce that illusion. It was true that I.
Kaypakkaya's views were more advanced than the views of the founders of
these groups. But that didn't make them Marxist; these views still were
a dogmatic version of Maoism.

To "prove" the
so-called communist nature of I. Kaypakkaya and of its own past, the TKP/M-L
Hareketi leadership chose to mention certain seemingly correct Marxist
statements and formulations, to be found even in every revisionist programme.
The Marxist statements and formulations that one could find inI. Kaypakkaya's and the TKPIM-L Hareketi's
basic writings,naturally
did not in any way suffice to characterize their lines as communist. As
to the TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership, it acknowledged the presence of "Maoist
elements" in its basic views; on the other hand it alleged that the existing
"Maoist elements" weakened, but did not change the "essentially Marxist-Leninist
nature" of these views!

The
constituents of the MLKP failed to solve this problem through ideological
discussion. The TKIH had correctly argued
that, all of the five groups mentioned above were petty-bourgeois revolutionary
groups, up until the time they openly rejected Maoism in 1979-1980; it
had also argued that the TKP/M-L Hareketi was obliged to alter its evaluation
regarding its past, if a real communist unity was to be effected. But the
TKIH had its own structural problems, such as organizational instability
and theoretical inadequacy, which produced a crisis of self-confidence.
This in turn prevented the TKIH from standing its grounds in the face of
the pressure of the TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership. Under these conditions,
the TKIH and a minority in the TKP/M-L Hareketi could not persuade the
TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership to drop its Maoist historiography. As to the
TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership, it never even intended to face its petty-bourgeois
past radically and openly. Despite its apparent "ideological tolerance
and liberalism", it obstinately and desperately clung to the strong remnants
of its petty-bourgeois democratism and Maoism and rejected to criticize
its own line inthe light of Marxism-Leninism. And to mask its anti-Marxist
insistence, the TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership tried to play down the immense
ideological significance of this question and attempted to portray this
disagreement as one pertaining only to history. Accordingly, this disagreement
was presented as one allegedly not having any decisive ideological significance
or any real relevance for the daily political work of the Party to be founded!
The TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership argued that, this question would not present
a problem for the communist unity of the Party!

In the end, this
hurdle was overcome in a non-Marxist manner.
It was left to the decision of the delegates
to the Unity Congress, the majority of whom voted against the traditional
opportunist assessment of the TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership. On
the face of it, the MLKP did therefore, reject the opportunist and Maoist
approach of the TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership to its past. This, however,
was an opportunist compromise and
not the product of a real ideological discussion in which vestiges of Maoism
were condemned and dealt a death blow.

Unfortunately,
the experience of the MLKP has proved this approach to be a great mistake.
The extremely important experience of international communist movement
was confirmed once again: Without definitely and unequivocally breaking
with all shades of opportunism and revisionism and cleansing itself of
all remnants of bourgeois democratic ideology, a revolutionary group cannot
embrace Marxism-Leninism firmly and follow a communist path. This opportunist
tradition of the TKP/M-L Hareketi was taken over by the MLKP, which would
prove the key to its silent and protracted liquidation.

In "What Is to
Be Done?", Lenin, referring to Marx, who criticized the leaders of Social-
Democratic Labor Party of Germany with regard to its unity with Lassalle's
National German Workers' Union, said:

"... he sharply condemned the
eclecticism in the formulation of principles: If you must combine, Marx
wrote to the Party leaders, then enter into agreements to satisfy the practical
aims of the movement, but do not haggle over principles, do not make 'concessions'
in theory".(Lenin, Selected Works, Vol.
2, p. 47) As expected, this
conciliatory attitude of the MLKP, taken over from the TKP/M-L Hareketi
leadership, would also prevent it from fighting consistently against anti-Marxist
tendencies of all hues both nationally and internationally and lead it
to seek an accommodation with them. Experience has shown that tolerance
toward opportunism is in essence, tolerance toward bourgeoisie and imperialism
and attempts at mixing Marxism-Leninism with revisionism will always condemn
relevant parties themselves to revisionism. TheMLKP brand of centrism, which
is characterized by unjustified tolerance to all sorts of petty-bourgeois
tendencies and lines disguising themselves as Marxist-Leninist, inevitably
leads and has led to the deepening of opportunism and to the strengthening
of reformism. It is obvious that, especially under present circumstances
characterized by:a) the absence of a strong international
communist movement;b) the domination of working class
movement by non-communist and non-revolutionary ideologies and policies;
andc) the tactical superiority of
bourgeoisie and imperialism, Marxist-Leninist organizations or those aspiring
to become such, are duty bound more than ever to preserve their ideological
purity and to fight consistently against all deviations from the correct
Marxist-Leninist path. MLKP leadership has never understood this simple
and vital fact or more probably it has preferred not to understand it. In portraying its
Maoist past and line as Marxist-Leninist, the TKP/M-L Hareketi leadership
was specifically aiming to exonerate itself. But this "method" could not
but lead to exonerating allrevisionismand to futile and reactionary efforts
at bridging the chasm between Marxism- Leninism and revisionism in general.
In accordance with this "method", the leaderships of the TKP/M-L Hareketi
and MLKP were "destined" for attempts at reconciling all brands of revisionism
with Marxism-Leninism and declaring all known revisionist leaders and parties,
including Kautskyites, Trotskyites, Titoites and Khruschevites etc. as
Marxist-Leninist. That was the
one of the reasons why, just 14 months after the Unity Congress, some representatives
of the MLKP, without any authorization from the CC and the Party as a whole,
could get involved with the dubious work of establishing a so-called
New Communist International in Sofia,
together with two revisionist or semi-revisionist groups. The aftermath
of this outrageous exercise, however, was more instructive of the stand
of the MLKP leadership: Despite a vigorous protest made by a few cadres
from inside the Party against this strange partnership with the KPD-Berlin
and the Communist Party of Bulgaria, it
tried to steer a middle course and presented it as a step forward! To shield
itself from internal and international criticism, however, it rejected
to call this organization New Communist
International and stated that it was for
its preservation, provided that it changed its name into the New
Communist International Coordinating Committee!
It was obvious that, this bizarre creature did neither have the right,
nor the chance to live and it died a silent death some months after its
birth. The reader should also be reminded that, it took a great amount
of pressure, lasting nearly a year to make the CC of the MLKP issue a written
self-criticism to world revolutionary public opinion with regard to this
adventure.

The MLKP's experience
has once more and tragically confirmed the merits of following a principled
policy and abiding by the basic premises of Marxism-Leninism. In his "The
Conditions of Affiliation To the Communist International" Lenin had said:

"7. Parties desiring to affiliate
to the Communist International must recognize the necessity of a complete
and absolute rupture with reformism and the policy of the 'Centre'; and
they must carry on propaganda in favor of this rupture among the broadest
circles of Party members. Without this it is impossible to pursue a consistent
Communist policy... "(Selected Works, Vol. 10,
p. 203) Another offshoot
of this petty-bourgeois approach and cast of mind has been the predominance
of a totally unjustified, but concealed contempt
for and neglect of theory, theresult of which has been theoretical
backwardness and confusion. The legal and illegal organs of the MLKP have
abounded in distortions of Marxist-Leninist theory. In fact, there have
been times, when the Party and its representatives have gone as far as
questioning the universality of certain Marxist-Leninist propositions.
A case in point is a speech delivered in 1996 to mark the second anniversary
of the establishment of the Party. The leading cadre who was delivering
this speech, conveniently forgot and eliminated all distinctions between
petty-bourgeois socialism and proletarian socialism, and accordingly called
on all radical revolutionary groups to "adopt the method of Marxism"! He
also referred to the following passage of Lenin's and dared to criticize
it:"Before we can unite, and in order
that we may unite, we must first of all draw firm and definite lines of
demarcation. Otherwise, our unity will be purely fictitious, it will conceal
the prevailing confusion and hinder its radical elimination."(Collected Works,
Vol. 4, p. 354) After mentioning
this passage of Lenin's, the speaker spelled out his conceited, but stupid
comments to the effect that these views were valid only for Russia at the
beginning of the 20thcentury!
He said:"Therefore, this passage of Lenin's,
which always has been utilized to justify ongoing unprincipled divisions
in Turkish revolutionary movement, does not carry much weight. This well-known...
view of Lenin's is fine and all right from a Russian vantage point, it
provides an answer to a concrete question; however, it doesn't carry a
significant weight from a Turkish vantage point."(Proleter Dogrultu, Nr. 11,
p. 88)This
comment was neither criticized by the Editorial Board of Proleter Dogrultu
('Proletarian Course'), the theoretical journal of the Party, which published
the text of the speech, nor by the CC of the MLKP. This openly indicated
the inimical stand of the speaker to the correct path of principled Marxist
unity and betrayed his liberal and opportunist position of "unity at all
costs". The delivery and publication of the speech containing several other
anti-Marxist evaluations, was no exception to the, conduct of the leaders
of theParty. Its publication
proved that it had the stamp of approval of the leadership and therefore
indicated the collusion of the MLKP leadership with the person in question.

What do this
unusual tolerance toward attempts at distorting Marxism-Leninism, this
indifference to, reluctance and utter inability in assimilating the advanced
theory and this failure in using it to guide the strategic course of the
Party signify? They signify a lack of enthusiasmand
a genuine interest toward the gigantic tasks of revolution in our country
and a lack of belief in the cause of revolution and socialism. The reflex
and attempt to belittle the importance of theory and the worshipping the
most backward forms of practical work, is the hallmark of an ordinary petty-bourgeois
democratic party. A communist party never perceives revolutionary theory
and practice as polar opposites, allegedly excluding and negating each
other; on the contrary it takes them as complementary aspects of a single
process, where they both influence, interact, guide and learn from each
other. In fact, our theory is not something divorced of the practical struggle
of the working class against capitalism. Stalin said:

"Theory is the experience of the
working-class movement in all countries taken in its general aspect. Of
course, theory becomes aimless if it is not connected with revolutionary
practice, just as practice gropes in the dark if its path is not illuminated
by revolutionary theory."(Foundations of Leninism,
p. 15)The above
mentioned indifference on the part of the MLKP leadership to theory, has
only been a different aspect of its - conscious or unconscious - attempts
to blur the line between Marxism- Leninism and all brands of opportunism
and revisionism. Such a party will never be able to establish the hegemony
of the proletariat in the democratic revolution and work for the ideological,
political and organizational independence of the proletariat, whatever
temporary practical successes it might win. That was the reason why, the
initial successes won by the Party during the first year of its life have
left almost nothing behind and have proved illusory.

Indifference
to the task of defending the principles of Marxism-Leninism, including
indifference to defend its own Programme and basic documents and sowing
theoretical confusion and promoting eclecticism betrays a self-denial of
a party's own communist and even revolutionary identity. In fact, this
means an indifference and concealed opposition to the cause of liberation
of workers and other toilers and an effort to make common cause with the
democratic bourgeoisie. And herein lies the essence of the liquidationist
strain that has characterized the MLKP and has brought it to the verge
of total destruction or more probably agradual
degeneration, whereby it will end up as an ineffective petty-bourgeois
reformist party. The opportunist tradition of the TKP/M-L Hareketi taken
over by the MLKP leadership has long transformed the Party into a loose
alliance of all sorts of different tendencies, into a wreck where an ideological,
political and organizational anarchy and decentralization reigns.

The experience of the MLKP has confirmed
the fact that, there can be no common and middle ground between those,
who are for Marxism-Leninism and those who are for opportunism and revisionism
and between those who are for bourgeois democracy and those who are for
the dictatorship of the proletariat and Soviet power. Any attempt to hold
or bring these two antagonistic parties together, will not only be futile,
but will also lead to reactionary results ideologically and politically.

July 2000

END NOTES

Endnote Number1:TIIKP ('Revolutionary Workers'
Peasants' Party of Turkey'), led by Dogu Perinqek, was a right Maoist party
advocating the theory of "Three Worlds", following an inimical policy toward
all revolutionary groups. It has been marching in the footsteps of Chinese
revisionism since its foundation at the beginning of the 1970's. During
the second half of the 1970's, this group applauded and supported Turkish
state in its efforts to suppress revolutionary action in the name of uniting
all forces, including US and Western European imperialists against the
"Main enemy", that is Soviet social-imperialism. Thoroughly exposed and
isolated, the group tried to change its complexion in the second half of
the 1980's and posed to follow a reformist-democratic line. In 1988, it
adopted the name "Socialist Party". Growth of the revolutionary movement
forced this group to show its real face once again. Since the beginning
of the 1990's, it has again started to openly support Turkish ruling classes,
in the name of anti-imperialism. At present, it is peddling its rotten
wares under the name of "Workers' Party."

Endnote Number 2:There also existed a "pro-Albanian"
group of Kurdish origin. This group, which called itself Kawa followed
a similar political evolution during the second half of the 1970's. A section
of Kawa accepted the theory of "Three worlds" and took the name Denge Kawa
('Voice of Kawa'); but was dissolved before 1980. A comparatively strong
organization in Turkish Kurdistan, Kawa itself was almost totally dissolved
after the military coup d'etat of 12 September due to the liquidationist
trend and lost most of its following to PKK. Toward the end of 1980's Kawa
slowly began to reconstitute itself and took the name Yekitiya Proletaryaye
Kurdistan ('Proletarian League of Kurdistan') and held a congress in 1992,
where it adopted a semi-revisionist, semi- Trotskyite, anti-Stalinist and
nationalist stand. This ideological retrogression prevented Kawafrom becoming a real force and joining
in the discussions for the "Unity of communist forces" that began at the
end of the 1980's. This stand also faithfully reflected the reformist and
liquidationist political and organizational line of Kawa leadership, which
has converted Kawa into a shadow of its former existence.

Endnote Number 3:Throughout this text, the term
"liquidationism" has been used times and again. Therefore, it will be useful
to provide an authoritative statement of Lenin as to its precise meaning.
He said:

"Of course, liquidationism is
ideologically connected with renegacy, with the renunciation of the
programme and tactics, with opportunism ... But liquidationism not
only opportunism. The opportunists are leading the Party to a wrong,
bourgeois path, the of a liberal labor policy, but they do not renounce
the Party, they do not dissolve it. Liquidationism is opportunism tat
goes to the length of renouncing the Party."("Controversial Questions", Selected
Works, Vol. 4, p. 126).Endnote Number 4:EKIM is a revolutionary organization
advocating a socialist revolution, which will accomplish some democratic
tasks in passing. This is a very small group with Trotskyite leanings.
EKIM, which considers itself the only communist group in Turkey, has taken
the name TKIP, at a congress held toward the end of 1998.

Endnote Number 5:At the moment, there are two Maoist
organizations in Turkey bearing this same name, There doesn't exist any
real or significant ideological difference between them. In Turkish political
literature they are differentiated by writing their name TKP/M-L and TKP
(M-L) respectively.

Endnote Number 6:On October the 13th, 1995, Abdullah
Ocalan had sent a letter to US President Bill Clinton urging him to "exert
his persuasive weight" on Turkey and to assist in "Stopping the massacre
of a people." In that letter, he had also stressed the fact that, his party
was "ideologically different from classical communist parties" and be and
his party were "not insisting on changing the frontiers of Turkey and were
not for secession from that country." In an interview
given in December 1995, Ocalan had called on all political forces in Turkey
to come to a consensus. In that interview, he had stated a collaborationist
theme as following:

"We will call on the army, we
will call on the bureaucracy. If you are in favor of a peaceproject with us, please come together.
We will call on socialists, we will call on liberals. Let's give an end
to this foolish course of events; there exists a common ground. We can
find a consensus, a conciliation; we all have our stake in this."(Dirilil Tamamlandi, Sira Kurtulusta,
p. 284)Endnote Number 7:TheMLKP
leadership almost systematically censured and blamed the workers for not
performing their leading role. It complained of their inability to march
in the direction shown by communist and revolutionary groups and to throw
off the yoke of trade-union bureaucrats. It criticized them for failing
under the influence of Turkish chauvinism and for not displaying their
open support for the Kurdish national movement. This attitude reflects
a totally mistaken understanding of the Party's role concerning the spontaneous
working class movement. It is up to the Party, to elevate itself to the
position of the vanguard through participating in all spontaneous actions
of workers against capitalists and by imparting socialist class consciousnessto them. If the workers could acquire
socialist class consciousness by themselves, there would be no need for
a Party. By behaving in this manner, the MLKP leadership was objectively
denying its role as the potential vanguard of the class and declaring itself
and the communist movement as a whole redundant. And liquidationism does
just this: It considers the communist party redundant and as a logical
corollary to this, opposes its existence.